John Upton

John Upton is a Senior Science Writer at Climate Central, where he has covered international climate negotiations, oceans research, climate change adaptation, and the global trade in wood energy. Upton has science and business degrees and a decade of international reporting experience. He has written for the New York Times, Slate, Nautilus, VICE, Grist, Pacific Standard, Modern Farmer, and Audubon magazine.

Recent stories by John Upton

Climate Change Behind Surge in Western Wildfires

The number of acres of forest burning yearly in large Western fires ballooned nine-fold from 1984 to 2015, with climate pollution and natural changes in the weather playing roughly equal roles in driving the deadly trend, research published Monday in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences concluded. The study showed that more than a

Climate Change is ‘Devastating’ The Great Barrier Reef

Warm ocean waters that sucked the color and vigor from sweeping stretches of the world’s greatest expanse of corals last month were driven by climate change, according to a new analysis by scientists, who are warning of worse impacts ahead. Climate change made it 170 times more likely that the surface waters of the Coral Sea, which off the

California Snowpack Returns, But Fears Held For Future

Climate change is projected to corrode California’s snowpack, forcing water officials to rethink how they store and distribute water in a state that’s prone to prolonged droughts. Efforts have begun to improve the management of water stored in the state’s underground aquifers, which could help compensate for its loss of snowpack storage. Despite

Research Paints a Bleak Picture for Great Barrier Reef

As greenhouse gas pollution reshapes the invisible mosaic of seawater chemicals washing over Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, corals there are being locked in escalating conflicts with each other for survival. A modeling-based study by Australian government scientists has tracked ocean acidification for the first time through all of the thousands o

Study Reveals Stunning Acceleration of Sea Level Rise

The oceans have heaved up and down as world temperatures have waxed and waned, but as new research tracking the past 2,800 years shows, never during that time did the seas rise as sharply or as suddenly as has been the case during the last century. The new study, the culmination of a decade of work by three teams of farflung scientists, has

Warming Is Increasing Wildfire Risks in California

Extreme wildfire seasons have been afflicting drought-parched California in recent years, and new computer modeling indicates that the state will continue to become more susceptible to ruinous fires as the world continues to warm. But the scientists behind an ambitious new study, which combined historical fire records and data with projections for

Will The West Ever Be Able To Live With Fire?

Scientific progress and more than a century of living with wildfire have boosted Western resilience to the threat. But improvements in how wildfire dangers have been managed have fallen far short of the reimaginations of landscapes that are needed. “We’ve made good progress, but not good enough,” Jan van Wagtendonk, a retired Yosemite National Par

Three Ways The West Can Adapt To Drought

The current Washington drought could help the West learn to adapt to one of the most profound effects that climate change is projected to bring to the region. Scientists warn that climate change could deliver “megadroughts” to the West, the likes of which haven’t been experienced in more than a millenium. “I’m seeing this year as a dress rehearsal

Three Tools to Solve The Mystery of Ocean Acidity

The United Nations General Assembly in late 2013 called on world governments “to urgently pursue further research on ocean acidification, especially programmes of observation and measurement.” Rapid advances since then could help scientists peer more deeply into the atomic structure of the water as policymakers search for local and global solutions

Warmer Seas Linked To East Coast Hurricane Outbreaks

New research shows that hurricane activity picked up along the American East Coast after 1400, following spikes in nearby sea surface temperatures of up to 3.5°F, before waning again late in the 1600s. Researchers who peered into mud to chronicle this and an earlier spike in hurricanes say such storms could become more common again as greenhouse ga

Sea Level Rise Making Floods Routine for Coastal Cities

Coastal American cities are sinking into saturated new realities, new analysis has confirmed. Sea level rise has given a boost to high tides, which are regularly overtopping streets, floorboards and other low-lying areas that had long existed in relatively dehydrated harmony with nearby waterfronts — a trend projected to worsen sharply in the comin

Hints of Climate Change in California’s Drought

The pressure that’s on drought-hit Californians to conserve dwindling water supplies is largely the result of a stubborn ridge of high pressure that has been parking itself off their coastline. That ridge has blocked water-laden winter storms, sending them spiraling northward instead of into the Golden State, reducing snowpacks that Californians us